“The Pool” by Helen Pinkerton

Rise to the surface, flex and spin and dart
Out of the water, in again, your leap
For the dragonfly that hums above defeated;
If it is caught, you fall with it again
Into the rippled morass of confusion,
Your perfect aim not to be so sustained,
For you are quick or slow beyond control.

Mirroring mountains, dark facsimile
Of yellow pine and blue-scarred granite face,
Your pool suddenly rises with spring rains
And surface melt from ancient snow deposits
Beneath the drift of seasons; or it drops,
In autumn, seeping down through stony gulches
That dry and shine amid the lifting willows.

Within this change you move, minutely felt
By air and water; and the dragonflies
Are real, are food reducible to fish;
And no leap takes you from these waters until
One day the brittle fly is cast and you,
Leaping and drawn at once, are pulled beyond
The flexions and reprisals of the pool.